Okay
by Elphie Fae
Summary: This started as a oneshot, evolved into chapters, and now I've cut it back into a oneshot again. Apologies, but I didn't have the time or the inspiration to keep going. :


**OKAY**

A/N: Whee. Hi, everybody. This would be my debut to the realm of the Grey's Anatomy fandom, and I'm oh-so-glad to be here. This is just a little bit of fluff that has been floating around in my mind for a while (don't let the angst at the beginning fool you--it is fluffy in the end, I swear!). Basically this was written over the course of a week and is set after last week's episode, Oh, The Guilt, and I was intending to get it up before last night's episode but I didn't have time. Soooo, we are pretending that, instead of being entirely cool with the whole "I told you I broke up with Finn, I threw myself at your feet and your only response was a heartless 'okay'" thing, Meredith overreacted (as she tends to do) and had a patented Meredith emotional breakdown. This was written while I was quite distracted and half-asleep (like I am 99.9 of the time) and drastically needs to be edited, but I have no time now that NaNoWriMo has started. So, please ignore the slight grammatical errors and things that sound rough/off, they will be fixed eventually, but please point them out to me in your reviews so I know what I have to fix.

---

"Meredith, you need to eat something."

I think that's what she said. Yes, that sounds right, that's what she said. But what does it mean? I pressed my forehead against the mottled glass of the shower door, feeling its cool, smooth surface against my feverish forehead, and whispering a shred of gratitude to life in general for providing us with shower doors to lean on. If I closed my eyes and concentrated hard enough on the coolness, I could almost completely black out Izzie's concerned voice and the throbbing in my head, and almost envision myself away from here. Maybe, if I tried hard enough, I could imagine myself right back where I should be on a free Friday night, somewhere with Derek, safe and happy.

At the very thought of him, I felt a tear trickle down my cheek and drip traitorously onto my hand, sparkling dimly in the fluorescent bathroom lighting. I glared at it menacingly before shaking it off, running the back of my hand across my eyes and turning slightly to face Izzie.

"What," I said flatly into her worried face, more a statement then a question.

"You need to eat something," she repeated emphatically, holding out a clean white Kleenex as a gesture of goodwill. "When did you last eat? I made you breakfast this morning, what have you eaten since?"

I willed all of my energy into a lifeless shrug, accepting the Kleenex gracelessly and balling it in my fist, but Izzie pressed on.

"You can't cry yourself sick on an empty stomach, Mer, honestly. Can I make you something? Some soup, a sandwich, something? Anything?"

"I don't know, Izzie," I replied slowly, my voice cracking from disuse. "I can't think right now. I need you to just go away." Before she had a chance to reply, I turned away again, tearing at the thin tissue until it lay in little shreds in my lap. For a moment I wasn't sure whether I actually heard the soft-spoken "Okay" or if I had just made it up, but when I looked up, she had gone, with such light footsteps that I hadn't even heard her leave.

---

"Meredith, look."

The cute, boyish voice crept through the fog in my brain, making me realize that I had been staring at the shower door for at least an hour, brooding, since I had sent Izzie away. I blinked a few times until my head cleared enough to process the words, and once I understood the instructions I turned my head slightly up towards the voice, squinting in the bright light. Something dangling from George's hand caught the light in a shiny plastic-like sort of way, and I reached out weakly to see what it was. As I frowned at the DVD in my hands, George let out a breathless, excited explanation, grinning his sweet little George grin.

"It's _Pretty Woman_," he said rapidly, crossing his legs and joining me on the bathroom floor. "I've got _Notting Hill_, _Runaway Bride_, _My Best Friend's Wedding_ and a bunch more downstairs from Blockbuster. I picked up some strawberry ice cream, too. We can have a real Julia Roberts marathon, an all-nighter, okay? What do you think?"

"You don't like strawberry ice cream." Not what he expected, I know, but it was all I could think to say. Nothing was working right now, nothing except my eyes, which just wouldn't stop leaking. I felt the way a gun must feel after the bullet is fired: empty, useless, emotionless and cold as steel.

George wasn't thrown off. "I didn't used to," he replied smoothly, taking back the DVD case when it was offered. "But if you like it I'll probably get used to it. What do you say, Meredith? You, me, Izzie and Julia Roberts, all night long."

"Not now, George," I said, averting my eyes from the crushed look on his face. "I'm not in the mood."

I wasn't looking at him, I couldn't look at him, but I know that he was looking down at the tips of his sneakers, despondent as a toddler who's just been scolded.

"Okay." And he left.

---

"Alright, Little Miss Doom-And-Gloom, you're screwed now. They've called for reinforcements."

"Hi, Cristina," I said dully, following her with empty eyes as she leaned against the shower door, sinking down to my level with her crazy Cristina hair and cynical Cristina expression.

"Bambi tells me you've been sitting here all day, crying and staring off into space and refusing every alcoholic drink they could think to offer you."

"That about sums it up," I whispered, sounding much more dramatic than I'd intended. I opened my mouth to tell her so, but decided against it, lapsing back into my comfortable silence. Cristina raised an eyebrow, waiting for an explanation, and sighed when she didn't get one. I could've sworn I heard her mutter "dark and twisty," but I didn't have the will to fight back. We waited in silence until, rolling her eyes, she finally asked.

"What is wrong, Meredith."

"You know what's wrong," I said quietly. "I told you right before I left the hospital."

"All I heard was that you told Shepherd about Finn and he said 'okay.' You weren't this torn up about it when you told me earlier," she replied, more concerned, slipping her warm hand awkwardly into my cold one. Somewhere in my shell of a person, I registered the fact that Cristina wasn't touchy-feely, and her attempt at comforting me was a sweet, sentimental gesture—but I still felt numb.

"But I got to thinking about it." I paused, blinking back tears, and sniffled a little, staring into my lap. "I was home alone, and had nothing to do, so I thought about it, and that's it, game over, I'm done, I lost. Finn's gone, he wouldn't take me back and I don't deserve it, and I broke his heart for nothing, because Derek's gone too. He's changed his mind. He doesn't want me. I had everything and now I have nothing. And I'm right back where I started, except worse off, because I'm going to have to go to work every day and see him there, and know I love him, and know that he didn't choose me. Twice. Twice he had me, right there, begging for him to love me, and he didn't. And you know what the crazy part is? I still love him. So much. It's the only thing I know, I'm so messed up right now, I feel like I don't know myself, except for him. I know I love him, and that's it."

"Oh, Meredith." It wasn't my imagination. I did hear sympathy in her voice. Jesus Christ, this must be even worse than I thought if I'm getting sympathy from Cristina. "Meredith, come on. You can't let a man define you. We are strong, we are invincible, we are women." Cristina wasn't a singer. She hit the notes flatly and awkwardly, and the entire image of her on the bathroom floor singing a Helen Reddy girl-power song was entirely ludicrous. I tried to smile, I really did, but I think the result was much more of a grimace-y sneer.

"Hey, I'm trying to be supportive here," Cristina complained at my unsatisfactory response. "You could at least laugh at me being stupid, because it doesn't happen often."

"So you think Derek and I are done for good?" I hadn't let myself believe it. But now Cristina was being all sympathetic and singing me silly songs and pitying me, so it had to be true.

"Well...I don't know. I wasn't there. But I don't think you should cry yourself silly over it until you know it's done for good. Shepherd does this kind of stuff all the time."

I rolled my eyes. "What if it was you, Cristina? What if it was you and Burke? And you had thrown a good relationship away only to find that he didn't care?"

She considered for a moment. "If it were me, I wouldn't have declined the tequila. Also," she continued, getting heavily to her feet, "I wouldn't be sitting on the bathroom floor. The bathroom floor is reserved for drunken nights and girls whose fiancés have just died in a tragic and unforeseen medical accident." She held out her hand to help me up. "Come on, Meredith. You're not on call tomorrow, are you?"

"No, I have the day off," I said dully, looking past her hand to analyze her face. "Do you really think—"

"I don't _know_, Mer," she repeated, waving her hand a little. "What I do know is that it's three AM on a sub-zero Friday night in the middle of November and you're sitting on the bathroom floor in the thinnest pair of jeans I've ever seen, trying not to cry. You need to go to bed."

A shiver ran through me as I processed what Cristina had said. My jeans _were_ thin; I could feel every inch of the freezing bathroom tiles through them, and I guess I had been chilly for a while. And when did it get to be three AM?

I gave up, offering up a limp hand. She heaved me up as gently as she could, putting a discomfited arm around my shoulders. "Come on," she said soothingly, giving my shoulder a little squeeze. "I'm going to get you all snuggly into bed and bring you up a plate of cookies. Have you seen the kitchen lately? It looks like it's been commandeered by an army of Keebler elves."

I smirked a little at that, and Cristina's own smile widened. "Glad to see somebody appreciates my humor," she said huffily, guiding me down the hall. "Izzie wasn't too pleased with that remark. But now I'm going to get you your cookies and get out of here. I've got work tomorrow, and I need to get to bed. Are you going to be okay?"

I nodded, slipping underneath the comforter and closing my eyes. "I think so. But just in case, do you think you could bring me another box of Kleenex?"

She opened her mouth, seemingly to protest, insist that I need to be strong, but checked herself and nodded instead. "Okay."

---

He hesitated. He had gone all this way, jumped into his car in the middle of the night and driven straight to her house without even stopping to consider what he was doing. He'd made it all the way to her dimly-lit porch with his hand halfway to the doorbell and only the crickets for company, and _now_ he hesitated. Though even the crickets seemed to disdain him tonight, still clicking away when all he needed was three seconds to hear himself think.

Derek considered his options. Ring the doorbell, and one of two things would happen—option A, he'd see Meredith, he'd apologize, she'd accept it and they'd end up getting no sleep tonight; or option B, he'd see Meredith, he'd apologize and she'd kick his ass right out to the curb where it belonged. But if he didn't ring the doorbell, only one thing would happen: he'd head back to his car, defeated, and stay up all night drowning in beer and self-pity. And Meredith would hate him, possibly forever. Without another thought, he rang the doorbell.

He waited with bated breath as the familiar ringing tune floated through the air, muffled behind the wooden door. He'd only begun to plan his apology when the door was flung open by a tall blonde girl, her hair up in a messy bun and a tray of hot cookies in her hand, words tumbling from her mouth so fast he could hardly discern them.

"Cristina, she's _fine_, go home, you've got work in the morning and Burke's probably worried out of his—oh. It's you." The chatter stopped as suddenly as it had begun, and now she stood stock-still in the doorway, glaring at him, her hand still on the doorknob. Derek flinched, preparing to get the door slammed right back into his face.

But she remained silent and the door didn't move. He shifted uncomfortably under her steely gaze, acknowledging the loathing look wordlessly. "Doctor Stevens," he began stiffly.

"What do you want?" she spat, the venom in her voice surprisingly sharp for sweet little Izzie. He couldn't meet her eyes, afraid that at any moment she might just chuck the whole pan of cookies at his head and call it a night.

"I wanted to see Meredith," he tried guiltily.

"You can't, she's sleeping. Too bad." The last phrase was punctuated by the sound of a door slamming, and suddenly he was again face-to-face with the polished wood of Meredith's front door. Great.

"Izzie," he pleaded, rapping on the door. "Izzie, please." His knocks sounded aimless and hollow on the unresponsive wood, and he figured he must've stood there for at least ten minutes trying to coax the door open again. When he finally began to consider giving up, the front door was opened again, although Izzie looked no more inviting than last time. And she hadn't put the cookies down, either.

"Derek, I told you she's sleeping. And no, you can't wake her up. Cristina finally got her to sleep a half hour ago, she'd been up the whole night sitting on the bathroom floor moping because you're an asshole."

Derek gulped, his heart sinking. "Did she…did she say that, exactly?"

Izzie rolled her eyes. "No, of course not," she said as sardonically as she could; sarcasm was Cristina's forte, not hers. "Meredith would never say that about you. She's completely head over heels in love with you and you just keep taking advantage of her. You've done enough damage for today. Go home."

"Can I at least just see her?" Derek begged instinctively; seeing her was better than coming for no reason at all. Izzie looked skeptical, as if she were still contemplating whether or not it would be a federal offense to beat him senseless with a cookie tray. "I won't wake her up," he promised cautiously. "I just…need to figure some things out."

Something shifted behind Izzie's impassive stare, and she accepted defeat with a graceful sigh. "Fine. But, I'd like you to understand, this is for Meredith's sake. Not yours. Get in." She slipped sideways to allow him entry, closing the door sharply behind him without a word. She disappeared into the kitchen and he drifted behind her like a shadow, casting worried glances all around him.

The kitchen was decimated. Cookies covered every counter and tabletop, plates and trays and stacks of them, and flour drifted slowly through the air like snow. Izzie worked mercilessly at another batch of cookies, chucking in ingredients and mixing them furiously, trying to clear a space on the counter for the tray of cookies in her hand. After a moment she realized that Derek still stood there, blinking dumbly at the mess, and glanced up.

"What?" she snapped, pushing loose hair out of her face. "I don't have to show you where her room is, do I?" He shook his head and turned to go, lingering only a second.

"Um, Izzie?" he tried, as lightly as he could.

"What?"

"Are…are you okay?" he asked, nudging a plate of cookies stacked at least a foot high. She rolled her eyes again, hardly touched by his concern.

"_I'm_ fine. These are for Meredith. Comfort food. Chocolate chip. Her favorite," she continued, quietly tracing the edge of a plate with the tip of her finger. She looked a little dreamy, and Derek turned to leave her with her reverie when she murmured something else; a peace offering. "Take one. There's plenty."

He nodded his thanks, taking a cookie and starting up the stairs, wondering what he was going to do. The cookie was warm and rich and consoling, baked to perfection as only Izzie could manage. He found his way to Meredith's door without even thinking; he had this outlandish idea that he could probably find his way to Meredith no matter where he was, regardless of if he'd ever been there or not. But as he came to a stop beside her door, he suddenly realized that he still didn't know what he was doing. What was the point of looking at Meredith, anyway? It would do nothing to ease his guilt, and it would be all he could do to restrain himself from calling her name and waking her up. Her door was closed, cold, a sign that visitors were unwelcome. His hand on the doorknob felt wrong; he knew he shouldn't disturb her. But he couldn't help it as he watched his hand turn the knob and inch the door open, casting a small shred of light into the blackness of the room.

Derek felt his heart clench as the light hit her face. She looked so tiny and forlorn, curled into a ball in the center of her huge double bed, her tear-streaked face glimmering as it caught the light. The bed was dotted all over with crumpled tissues, and a nearly empty cookie plate rested by her head, littered with crumbs. He squinted at a leather jacket left on a chair by her bedside, trying to decide if it was Cristina's or not, when his thoughts were interrupted by a soft, feminine murmur.

"You know how sick she gets after her sixth shot of tequila?" He wasn't sure when Izzie had materialized at his side, but he wasn't surprised. He nodded his answer, afraid of where the conversation was going. "Try that times five," Izzie continued, shaking her head sadly. "That's how sick she made herself, crying over you." And as suddenly as she had appeared, she was gone, away back to her kitchen like a shadow, leaving him alone with Meredith.

If he listened hard enough, he could faintly hear her rhythmic breathing, still a little shuddery with tears. His own throat tightened at the sight, and he was hit with the sudden realization that if he decided to have an emotional breakdown, no one would be there to sit next to his bed or bake him cookies. He didn't have a Cristina or Izzie or George. He didn't even have Addison or Mark anymore. The only one who'd be there was Meredith. Even after today, even after what he'd said, if he needed her, she'd be there and he knew it. And that was all he needed.

He slipped through the doorway as quietly as he could, sliding off his shoes. Before he realized what he was doing, he was at her bedside, sitting quietly down in the chair, which still smelled like Cristina's spicy perfume. Meredith, sensing a disturbance in the room, frowned and mumbled something in her sleep, uncurling herself in favor of a more comfortable position. He watched her face relax as she settled back down, her breathing soft and even. Her curled fingers twitched once, as if to grab tighter onto someone else's hand. Instinctively Derek reached out and wove his own fingers in between hers, her tiny hand resting in his larger one.

A slight rustle came from the direction of the door, and a shadow was cast on Meredith's sleeping face. Derek turned guiltily, squinting at Izzie's still form in the doorway, but didn't let go of Meredith's hand. He opened his mouth to offer a whispered explanation, but Izzie shook her head.

"You never know how much you need something until it's gone," she whispered faintly, silencing him.

He glanced back at Meredith, his heart sinking. The very thought of Meredith being gone made him sick to his stomach. "Izzie, please—"

"You do whatever you have to do, Derek," she replied, turning to leave. "But as far as Cristina's concerned, I did not encourage this."

He nodded absently, preoccupied with how to slip in next to Meredith without waking or frightening her. He hesitated over the bed, considering his options.

"Oh, and Derek?"

"Yeah?"

"Meredith sleeps like a rock."

He grinned, hearing Izzie's footsteps disappear down the hallway, and slid into bed, taking Meredith in his arms. He buried his face in her warm neck, holding her as tightly as he dared. She smelled like lavender. She always smelled like lavender.

Meredith adjusted easily to this new development, wrapping her arms around his neck and tangling one hand limply in his hair. "Derek," she breathed dreamily, nuzzling at his cheek. Her eyes fluttered open slowly, and it took a minute before she could distinguish dreams from reality.

"Derek!" she shrieked, recognizing the hair twisted around her hand. Before memories of the day floated drifted back to her, she clutched him tighter out of instinct, pulling him closer.

"Shhh," he whispered into her neck, running his hand through her silky hair. "I promised Izzie I wouldn't wake you."

"But…but what about today?" she asked as the room came into focus.

"I…I'm sorry, Mer." She could easily hear the guilt dripping from his voice. "Addison chose that moment to tell me something I really didn't want to hear, and I was just a little…scared, I guess. Scared to make another commitment that might turn out wrong."

"Derek, I would never cheat on you," she insisted, the sleep fading from her voice as she reached for the light switch.

"Shh, lay back down. I know," he whispered, pulling her back into his arms. She felt his fingers brush at her hair, methodically stroking it as she lay back down, placing her head on his chest. They sat in silence for a while, him stroking her hair, as her eyelids began to flutter again. "I know you'd never cheat on me. And I'm sorry I doubted us." She didn't reply, and Derek smiled as he heard her breathing begin to even out.

"I love you, Meredith," he whispered into her hair.

Her whispered reply was dreamy and faraway, and after the moment passed, he was almost certain he imagined it.

"Okay."


End file.
